A review by squidbag
Doctor Who: The Coming of the Terraphiles by Michael Moorcock

4.0

Moorcock is one of the grand old men of British Sci-Fi, something I wasn't fully aware of until I was about a quarter of the way through this book with it's bombastic, florid, poetical writing style and I went and looked him up after a "who the hell IS this person?" kind of moment. This accounts, at least in part, for his melodramatic bordering on comic opera style, and his flights into the fantastical, when a description of a thing can go on for twice as long as the action performed on or with it. Moorcock has also used this book to integrate some of his "second aether" characters, and if you're not previously familiar with them, they will seem somewhat stitched on. All that said, this was an engaging read, but not really like a Doctor Who book, which seem to have somewhat of an established "house style." This one would rank near the top of a list of literary Who books, but gets low marks for accessibility and faithfulness to character. In short, you'd almost have to be a fan of fantasy/sci-fi from the 1950s through the 1980s AND a Whovian to really get into this one. A quality, but complicated, read.